The Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act (FERPA), a Federal law, requires that LEAs, with certain exceptions, obtain your written consent prior to the disclosure of personally identifiable information from your child’s education records. However, LEAs may disclose appropriately designated “directory information” without written consent, unless you have advised the LEA to the contrary in accordance with LEA procedures. The primary purpose of directory information is to allow the LEA to include this type of information from your child’s education records in certain school publications. Examples include:
- A playbill, showing your student’s role in a drama production
- Sports activity sheets, such as for wrestling, showing weight and height of team members
- The annual yearbook
- Graduation programs
- Honor roll or other recognition lists
Directory information, which is information that is generally not considered harmful or an invasion of privacy if released, can also be disclosed to outside organizations without a parent’s prior written consent. Outside organizations include, but are not limited to, companies that manufacture class rings or publish yearbooks. In addition, federal law requires LEAs receiving assistance under the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) to provide armed forces recruiters or institutions of higher education, upon request, with the following information – names, addresses and telephone listings – unless parents have advised the LEA that they do not want their student’s information disclosed without their prior written consent.
If you do not want the LEA to disclose directory information from your child’s education records without your prior written consent, you must notify the LEA in writing by the start of the current school term. The CLIU#21 has designated the following information as directory information:
- Student’s name
- Address
- Telephone listing
- Electronic mail address
- Photograph/video image
- Date and place of birth
- Major field of study
- The most recent educational agency or institution attended
- Dates of attendance
- Grade level
- Degrees, honors, and awards received
- Student ID number, user ID, or other unique personal identifier used to communicate in electronic systems that cannot be used to access educational records without a PIN, password, etc. (A student’s SN, in whole or in part, cannot be used for this purpose)